Why George Clooney And Viola Davis Believe Hollywood Is "Destroying" Artists

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[size=62]Why George Clooney And Viola Davis Believe Hollywood Is "Destroying" Artists[/size]

Both of these incredible Academy Award-Winners have some solid points about how the Hollywood studio system continues to work.

BY DYLAN PARKERPUBLISHED 1 DAYS AGO








While George Clooney and Viola Davis may have a somewhat secret friendship, the pair have both been outspoken about the damage Hollywood has done (and continues to do) to artists. Now, this may seem counter-intuitive since Hollywood is the reason why both George and Viola are so successful. Many of George Clooney's best movies, according to IMDb, are actually bigger Hollywood projects. However, critics tend to claim that it's his less mainstream work, such as his Academy Award-nominated performance in Michael Clayton, that deserves our attention. The same goes for Viola Davis.

However, both of these incredible Academy Award-winning thespians have some solid points about how the Hollywood studio system continues to work. And they made these points at a star-studded roundtable...

[size=39]On The Topic Of Diversity[/size]

Of course, this roundtable took place back in 2012. Therefore, some of the points might be slightly outdated. Unfortunately, most of what they said in the interview with The Daily Beast TV is still relevant today. And this just means their points about what Hollywood does to artists are even more valid. It seems as though the rest of the panel (the late-Christopher Plummer, Charlize Theron, Tilda Swinton, and Michael Fassbender) agreed.

Daily Beast



The entire discussion came up when the interviewers asked Viola how her role in The Help (which she later regretted) was her very first leading role. After all, prior to The Help, she had been nominated for Academy Awards in The Best Supporting Actress category. So, why did it take so long for her to get cast in a leading role?

RELATED:[size=26]Viola Davis & Other Celebrities Who Regret Their Famous Film Roles[/size]

"It's just the politics of it all," Viola Davis began.

"They're not that many roles for [women of color]," George Clooney chimed in, throwing it back to Viola.

"Look, I'm a 46-year-old Black woman who really doesn't look like Halle Berry, and Halle Berry is having a hard time. There's just not a lot of leading roles [for women of color]."

While Charlize Theron encouraged Viola not to denigrate her own looks, Viola claimed she has an awareness of the image she projects.

"African Americans represent 12.5% of the population and that is not the demographic that we are targeting in the movie and television industry," Viola Davis said to Michael Fassbender after he asked about the issue of racial inequity in Hollywood.

George Clooney added that Hollywood doesn't seem to target women anymore even though the industry in the 30s and 40s was mostly geared toward them.

"And even before that, if you think about the origins of Hollywood, it was really pioneered by women," Tilda Swinton added. "Mary Pickford. Lillian Gish."

[size=39]Hollywood Picks Projects They Think Will Appeal To 'Dumb' Audience Members[/size]

What's occurred in the past few decades in Hollywood is a studio and network system that gears the vast majority of their projects toward a white male audience. Therefore, they pick stories about people who look and sound the same, essentially claiming that people don't want great stories about people who are different.

"The people who makes these decisions always aim at the lowest common denominator and say, 'Well, the audience won't get it. I get it. But the audience won't get it because they're dumb,'" George Clooney explained before going into how much the network behind E.R. initially hated the show as they thought it was too smart for mass audiences... Little did they know that E.R. was destined to become a massive hit.

RELATED:[size=26]Why George Clooney Told Ben Affleck Not To Play Batman[/size]

"Everything is playing towards the idea of 'Let's do some crappy show that everyone will get'. And the truth is, if you look at television over the years, look at films over the years, the true successes were the smarter shows. M*A*S*H, Taxi, you go down the list, Cheers, all the shows--Seinfeld--that suffered to get there. And the same thing has happened with film, which is.... there becomes this idea, this narrative, that say, "Well, you know, it's gonna be 13 to 30-year-old white men, which is the target,'" George explained. "[But] there is an audience for all of this, we've just forgotten them."





Michael Fassbender then backed George's point up by recalling a story where a mega-producer told him (regarding a project) that the audience 'wasn't ready' to see it.

"Like what the f*** do you know, you arroagant p**ck," Michael Fassbender said.

Ultimately, each of these titans of industry are claiming that the audience is more intelligent, capable, and interested in seeing a diverse selection of projects because the audience is always going to bring their own perspectives, baggage, and history to any great story. Thus, they will be able to relate and, most importantly, enjoy it regardless of their age, sex, race, or religion.

But the networks and studios, especially, seem to fight back against this idea by sticking to a paradigm that suits one specific demographic... or so they think...

"And what happens with all of that is you destroy the artist," Viola explained. "Art within all of those confines... dies."

That's an odd article. Is it new? I wonder why it's just come up now?

Well, the discussion took place in 2012 but I don't know why the writer brought it up again now. Things have changed since then but it's still true that the target audience for most film and tv audiences is young white males. The focus on all the superhero  es/franchises pulls funding away from most intelligent adult product. I guess that's what happens when the bean counters take over the industry. People like George and Viola Davis have a harder time getting quality projects made.